How did conniving Mullahs gain upper hand in sonar
Bangla?

A.H. Jaffor Ullah

How time has changed in my ancestral homeland,
Bangladesh! Hardly few years ago if I would have
written an article critiquing the obscurantist mullahs
of my motherland detailing how they are dictating the
social agendas and submit those article via Internet,
the chances were higher that the articles won’t see
the light of the day. However, now things have turned
180 degrees. Go ahead and open the web version of any
newspapers in Dhaka excepting maybe Inquilab or the
likes of it that peddled fundamentalists’ view – you
will be in for a pleasant surprise. Now most
editorials and Op-Ed articles would vilify one way or
another the fundamentalists of various hues that took
the nation of 145 million mostly impoverished people
for a joyride in a slow and outdated cart whose name I
better not mention here lest I offend the religious
sensibility of many a folk in Bangladesh. The ride
ended rather abruptly. Thanks to western governments
for they threw the proverbial monkey wrench to spoil
the fun and games of scheming mullahs who are now
running for the cover. It seems as if, the only
language the ruling government of Khaleda Zia
understands is the spoken by Uncle Sam. What the
powerful uncle wants he gets it. The memory of Daisy
Cutter Bombs wreaking havoc amongst Afghan and Iraqi
people while creating soccer stadium sized enormous
crater in ground zero is still fresh. So, why fuss
with the Bush Administration? Good logic one might
say.

The ruling elites of Bangladesh were having endless
parties for the last few years and they want the party
to continue; thus, why not listen to America or EU.
Or else, they may take the punch bowl away from the
party. No body amongst the ruling party wants this to
happen; thus, came the arrest order for troublemakers
who had been blasting homemade bombs since 1999. The
editors of Dhaka’s newspapers welcomed the move by the
government and they wrote rather effusively how the
government became so proactive in catching the
masterminds of Islamic terrorism for once and all. A
few of the editors however thought the arrests were
stage-managed. It has been a while that the two
bigwigs (Shaikh Abdur Rahman and Siddiqul Islam) of
Jihadi movement were nabbed but the government is
buying time to make the exciting story into humdrum
gossip stuff. Soon people will find other interesting
subjects such as the upcoming parliamentary election
to talk about and in the process the nation will
forget who did protect the Shaikh and Bangla Bhai and
which banks help laundered the money coming from
Middle East. Haven’t we seen how the memory of
grenade blasts in Awami League meeting ground in
August 2004 and Kibria killing in January 2005 had
faded from the mind of our people. Time, for sure,
has healing power and the government of Khaleda Zia
knows this axiom. Therefore, wait few more months to
notice that not many people are talking about diabolic
figures such as Shaikh Rahman, Bangla Bhai or Prof.
Ghalib. Oh, I forgot one more thing. People will
become disinterested in knowing who amongst the ruling
party did lend a helping hand to JMB goons and which
bank helped the bombers and grenade tossers to
bankroll their heinous activities.

Through this article, I would like to bring into fore
how the mullahs or Islamists gained the upper hand
while transforming this docile agrarian society into a
very violent one in the span of over half a century.
Yes, readers believe it or not the seed of
Islamization was sown in pre-partition time. It took
more than two decades to break the dormancy of the
seed. The seed germinated and the young seedling was
about to be killed in post liberation day by Sheikh
Mujib’s policy. Boy, was it good news for the Isla
mists that a Ray-Ban clad Major General who once
joined the liberation movement under questionable
circumstances brought back the Islamists into the
parlor politics of Bangladesh after conspiring with a
band of rogue majors in the army and a pro-west Awami
League leader. Sheikh Mujib, the father figure of the
nascent republic, was assassinated along with his
entire family barring two daughters who were out of
the country at the time. The seedling of the
poisonous plant (in Bengali called Bish-Brikkho) was
growing happily under the tutelage of the first
military dictator of the nation, Gen. Ziaur Rahman. A
cantonment intrigue did him in following the adage
that that plays with sword may die from it. It was a
blessing in disguise, really. Another charlatan army
general was waiting in the wings in 1982 to take the
nation the path of Islamization only to consolidate
his power. The rogue General provided the needed
nutrition to make the poisonous plant grow at an
accelerated pace. Lake, the bespectacled first army
General who engineered the first coup d’etat, the
second one also maimed the secular constitution of
Bangladesh by inserting such phrase as “The state
religion of the Republic is Islam, but other religions
may be practiced in peace and harmony in the
Republic.” (Article 2A of Part 1 – The Republic].

The first despot (the Ray-Ban clad one) also changed
the preamble of the 1972 constitution effacing the
word “secularism” and then replacing later the
following phrase: “The principles of absolute trust
and faith in the Almighty Allah, nationalism,
democracy and socialism meaning economic and social
justice, together with the principles derived from
them as set out in this Part, shall constitute the
fundamental principles of state policy. (1A).
Absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah shall
be the basis of all actions.] [Part II Fundamental
Principles of State policy].
The mullahs of the country took the cue from the
military despot thinking that the nation has become a
full-fledged Islamic country. The founding fathers of
the nation had this idea that the newly formed nation
will have a secular fabric going forward. But how
quickly, politics had changed the course of the
nation. Many observers of Bangladesh in the mid
seventies thought there was a conspiracy in three
camps, namely cantonment, civil bureaucrats, and in a
faction of Awami League headed by Khandaker Mustaque
to remove Sheikh Mujib from power. They thought Islam
was in great danger in the nascent republic where fine
arts, music, drama, poetry, etc., were flourishing at
an astonishing pace. The Mullahs were marginalized in
the new republic because of their conspiratorial role
during our liberation movement in 1971. The
Islamists, therefore, heaved a great sigh of relief
when they learned that Awami League was made a
leaderless political entity in the aftermath of Sheikh
Mujib’s assassination and in the wake of November jail
House killing in which the top echelon of secular
political party were wiped out by the waving of
conspiratorial hands in the military barrack. Thanks
to army General Ziaur Rahman. No wonder the mullahs
revered this dangerous man.
The two military despots who ruled with an iron fist
from 1977 from 1989 helped the cause of Mullahs. The
marathon outdoor preaching session by Wahhabites,
which dates back to 1940s, received a boost in the arm
when the first despot gave government land to Tablig
al-Jamaat in the edge of the northern suburb of Dhaka
in Tongi. The General himself used to attend the
5-day preaching session in winter month to show his
utmost religiosity. The same thing happened during
the rule of second military despot. These two men in
uniform thought that if they could please the hoi
polloi of the nation, they could rule the country
uninterrupted. These two despots were not religious
at all, but the wily mullahs played into their game
willfully.
The real dark horse during the reign of the second
despot was the political party Jamaat-i-Islami. This
was a hodgepodge of Islamic-minded people who believed
in theocracy. This party wanted Bangladesh to be a
truly Islamic nation a la Taliban Afghanistan. Many
rank and file Jamaat went to Afghanistan to fight
Russian communists alongside with Afghan Mujahedeens.
When the Soviet soldiers left Afghanistan in 1989
after ten years of bloody fighting, these Jihadi
Bangladeshi fundamentalists returned home with Islamic
ideals. They learned guerrilla warfare tactics while
they were in occupied Afghanistan. Now they wanted to
put their newly acquired skills into use in theirs
motherland. Many of them joined madrassahs (Islamic
schools) where they recruited young students for the
cause of Islamic Bangladesh. As this was going on, we
read the news of frequent post-Jumma (Friday) prayer
procession from Dhaka’s main mosque where calls for
Islamic Constitution Movement were given with a
regular periodicity.
The Islamists did their ground work all through the
1980s and 1990s in all nooks and crannies of
Bangladesh. Many Islamic NGOs were set up in the
villages and the nation saw a proliferation of mosque
and madrassahs construction. No accurate count is
available but suffice it to say that there are tens
and thousands of madrassahs scattered allover the tiny
nation of which some are even called Quomi or National
madrassah.
Let us look at the financial sector Bangladesh for
telltale sign of Islamization. The Islamic banks
started their business in the nation at the same time
to address the difficult question of interest payment
to Muslims, which is against the basic tenet of Islam.
No body noticed that suddenly many activities got
underway all in the name of Islam. All these
enterprises had one goal – take the nation to the path
of Islam. Some Muslim preachers thought being a
Muslim was not good enough – Bangladesh needs to be an
Islamic country – 100%. The impetus for this idea
came in late 1970s from two world events namely
emergence of mullahdom in Iran where Imam Ayatollah
Khomeini transformed the Iranian society from
pro-western to an Islamic one. The second idea came
from a predominant Sunni nation of Afghanistan. The
clarion call for saving Islam in Afghanistan came from
the clergies as they fought the mighty Russians. When
the Russians finally decided to leave Afghanistan in
late 1980s after fighting a bloody war for about ten
years the mullahs allover were elated falsely assuming
that no force is good enough to block the growth of
Islam as a political entity.
The above political developments in Iran and
Afghanistan helped solidify the belief amongst mullahs
in Bangladesh that the nation of teeming Muslims will
one day become a truly Islamic nation just like the
ones in Iran and Afghanistan. Thus, one of the battle
cries in Bangladesh was “amra hobo taliban, bangla
hobe afghan” (We will become Taliban).
While visiting Bangladesh in the summer of 2001 I went
to Cox’s Bazar by road from Dhaka, which gave me a
rare opportunity to see the countryside of my
ancestral homeland. I could not believe my eyes what
I saw happening to the secular fabrics of this nation.
Not only that many roadside mosques and madrassahs
mushroomed in the rural areas, the number of preachers
in bazaars doing fund raising while resorting to
marathon preaching also went up. Most local preachers
were using a language that had Arabic and local
dialects mixed up and they were telling horrific tales
to scare people if they do not follow the strict
dictums of Islam. Upon inquiring I learned that these
mullahs mostly belong to Ahle Hadis group or some
variety of Wahhabi sects. Needless to say that the
Sufi variety of Islam that was so prevalent in rural
Bangladesh was on the way out. The likes of Tablig
al-Jamaat, Ahle Hadis, and Wahhabites had made a good
penetration in Bangladesh society for which the
Kakrail mosque located in the eastern corner of Ramna
Garden should get the full credit. What is more
disturbing is Bangladesh’s educated class who I
thought was the shock absorber of these alien concepts
fell victim to marathon preaching of the mullahs.
Thus, Delwar Hossain Saydee (a self proclaimed Allama
from Jamaat), Obaidul Hoque (Khatib of Dhaka’s main
mosque Bait-ul Muqarram), Fazlul Haque Amini (a self
acclaimed Mufti), Azizul Hoque (a self proclaimed
Shaikh ul Hadis), Ghulam Azam (ex-chief of Jamaat),
Motiur Rahman Nizami (present chief of Jamaat and
cabinet member of Khaleda Zia government, 2001-2006),
and more like them have becomes the spokesperson for
Islam in Bangladesh.
Recently, I visited a website by the name Islam in
Bangladesh (http://www.islam-bd.org/), which I think
is a mouthpiece of Jamaat. Quite a few things are
very interesting and worth noting in this website.
They have given a prestigious list of “Legendary
Islamic Heroes” in Bangladesh in which one could find
the name of General Ziaur Rahman, the first despotic
military ruler who ushered in the Islamic parties into
politics. Ziaur Rahman was never inclined to Islam in
his personal life but to consolidate his power he used
it rather blithely. The mullahs know it very well
about the General’s pro-west lifestyle but to show
their allegiance to him they included his name in the
coveted list of Islamic heroes in Bangladesh. The
website also includes the name of Prof. Shamser Ali,
Shah Abdul Hannan, and quite a few mullahs who are
prominent among preaching (waaz mehfil) circuits in
the country. Prof. Shamser Ali’s dubious contribution
to the growth of Islam is legendary for he found a
connection between the celestial trip Meraj and
Einstein’s theory of relativity. Another secularly
educated charlatan, Shah Abdul Hannan, has already
become a think-tank guru among Islamists for his
“erudition” and vast knowledge in Islam. These crafty
writers have given the much-needed intellectual
support for the growth of Islamism in Bangladesh.
As I was penning the article, a thought came to my
mind regarding the role of civil society in Bangladesh
in the rapid growth of Islamism in the country. The
pillars of Bangladesh civil society are all educated
from secular schools, colleges, and universities.
Many of them also had gone abroad to receive higher
education and training. But surprisingly, they let
the mullahs take over the control of Bangladesh
society. I am still waiting to hear or read any
article in the 1980s and 1990s in which some brave
thinkers would tell the mullahs bluntly that a line
should be drawn to demarcate the province of religion
and social life. Mullahs have a role to play in
society but the context should be religion. Thus,
they have a role in birth, marriage, and death of
Muslims similar to one played by church preachers and
Brahmins for respective communities. But when the
jihadi Mullahs of Bangladesh started to cross the line
telling people how to lead their life and restructure
the governance of the society to reflect Islam in all
layers of the society, then, the writers,
intellectuals should have forewarned the Bangladesh
society about the negative side of this
transformation. The polity under the control of
mullahs would transform an otherwise vibrant society
immersed in science and technology, and modernity into
something like antiquated time. All the growth
humanity had made in last two-hundred century in
communication, education, medicine, civil law, public
administration, etc., would stop to make rooms for
obscurantist-led ideas in which all the gains made
thus far will be wasted. Still then, the pillars of
society kept their mouth sealed and saw the glide of
society to yesteryears. This was very painful for me
to watch the inactivity amongst the very brightest
people of Bangladesh.
In 1999, I wrote some satirical pieces in Daily Star
while revealing the inane behavior of Bangladesh’s
mullahs for which I received not commendation but
execration. In 2000 I met a DU professor of Economics
in New Orleans when I asked him what he thinks about
the growing menace of Islamists. His flat reply was
that in Islamists won’t pose a threat to Bangladesh
society. To bolster his opinion he said that Jamaati
politicians are not vote grabbers. I however begged
to differ with him.
Every time I visited Bangladesh I saw telltale signs
of Bangladesh going the Mullahs way. It was scary to
see the one-hundred names of Allah in Arabic written
on a wall outside the Old Airport located in Tejgaon
where I grew up in the 1950s and 1960s. Please see
the Islamic structure right opposite the gate of Zia
International Airport that sports some Arabic slogans.
Who are paying for all these and where do they want
to take this nation. A foreigner would mistakenly
think that Arabic is widely spoken here and our
culture is stepped in Middle Eastern ethos.
The Mullahs of Bangladesh brainwashed our people to
the extent that many college graduates changed their
view once they cross half-century mark. These
otherwise sensible people become so much enamored with
Islam that they don’t mind joining Tablig al-Jamaat, a
revivalist movement that flourished in Sonar Bangla
because of tireless work of many Mullahs who were
influenced by the teachings of Deobandi Mullahs and
Wahhabi doctrine. These folks suddenly become
fatalistic thinking that everything about human being
is programmed by a superior force. With this kind of
thinking, the Mullahs “learned” opinion made inroads
in many folks’ personal life. They do not question
the intelligence of a preacher; they simply followed
his dictums. Suffice it to say that rationality has
no place in these environs. It is not only the common
people but many full professors of Dhaka University,
Rajshahi University, Chittagong University, etc.
suddenly find their epiphany in late life. Some of
them tirelessly work to find out if Meraj was possible
in the light of quantum physics, or if DNA was
programmed by God. Thus, it is not out of the
ordinary to find that many of the ex-professors in
Bangladesh then join dubious Islamic organizations.
These are Shamser Alis and Shah Hannans of Bangladesh
civil society. Some of them are Internet-savvy enough
to post their rebuttals in various forums. People
like Mr. Shah Abdul Hannan think it is their duty to
defend the superiority of Islam in the Net. By
defending the religion these folks think that they are
serving Islam.
I could easily write more on the subject of roles
played by poorly educated mullahs to Islamize
Bangladesh. However, I should limit my discussion
lest the article becomes a prolix one.
To sum up, through the caprice of some genius
politicians the Mullahs came to the limelight. A
faction of Islamists became delusional in thinking
that they could change the secular and manmade
constitution of Bangladesh if they simply give a
clarion call for jihad. Is the worst is over as far
as Islamization of Bangladesh is concerned? I do not
think so. The government caught a few radical
Islamists who were blasting homemade bombs to usher in
Islamic Sha’ria laws. The government only caught few
leaders from one banned Islamists’ party but what
about the others? My take on this is the following:
as long as Mullahs are spreading fundamentalists’
dogma through hard preaching, the jihadi activities
will remain alive in our ancestral homeland.
Therefore, we should not think for a moment that bomb
blasting, and grenade lobbing is going to go away from
Bangladesh. On top of it, all the proliferation of
Islamic schools (read: Madrassahs) would produce
innumerable numbers of new graduates every year.
Would the graduates come home to roost? Only time
could tell. Therefore, remain alert. Contrary to
what Alex Perry wrote in Times Asia in the second week
of April 2006, all is not well in Bangladesh.
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Dr. A.H. Jaffor Ullah, a researcher and columnist,
writes from Ithaca, New York.